I suffer from a fairly common condition that, in the medical community, is known as Male Alopecia. I like that word: "alopecia." It sounds like some sort of exotic flower with hundreds of delicate petals and a honey dew center that attracts hummingbirds and bumblebees.
In reality, alopecia means "a loss of hair, or baldness." And, truth be told, I'd rather have an exotic flower sprouting from my head than suffer a loss of hair. Still, it was an unavoidable fate for me. All I have to do to map out my genetic future is to look at my grandfather on my mother's side of the family. On the one hand, he lived to be 90 years old. On the other hand, he went bald in his early 20s.
I, too, went bald in my early 20s, which is to say I was 19. Okay, I wasn't really totally bald at the age of 19, but it was pretty darned obvious that I no longer had a nice full head of hair, and the remaining hairs up top were having a hard time maintaining their hold. A stiff breeze would ensure the departure of, at least, 8,000 hairs.
I fought it, of course, utilizing the most technological advances of the time which, in 1994, basically consisted of Rogaine. If you've ever used Rogaine, you know that it's quite possibly the dumbest substance ever created. You have to be really determined to thwart baldness to use Rogaine. And, at the age of 19, I was really determined.
Rogaine works like this: every morning and every evening, I sprayed three spritzes of a heavily alcohol-based solution onto the front and back of my scalp. I then massaged the substance in. The end result was, basically, kind of a grimy feeling head, like I had poured a shot of vodka in my hair and rubbed it in for no particular reason.
I was mortified that somebody would discover any of the components that made up my Rogaine arsenal. And, trust me, it was an arsenal. There were so many types of application devices, you'd think I was conducting some sort of surgery.
So, I kept my Rogaine hidden. I didn't want people to know I was fighting baldness, even though a quick glance at my hairline seemed to indicate I wasn't fighting it so much as doing a French surrender. Because, you see, the Rogaine really didn't work for me. I guess there may have been a few hairs taking tentative root, but I think they did so more out of pity than anything else.
Still, because I didn't want to think I was pouring vodka shots into my hair for no good reason, my mind made me believe there was progress being made up there. I would inspect my head each night with a thoroughness that would impress Sherlock Holmes. I practically had a name for every hair on my head, I was so familiar with them.
Then, one day, at the age of 21, as my Rogaine bottle neared depletion, and I was facing the shame of going, yet again, to the pharmacy to pick up some more, where I would endure the knowing smiles of the clerk behind the counter that seemed to say "well, you may not be treating crabs, but you're bald, bald, BALD," I decided that enough was enough.
That night, I made a bet with my roommate that the Detroit Lions would beat the Minnesota Vikings. The loser would have to shave his head. It was a slick bit of manipulation on my part, because the Detroit Lions had about as much of a chance of winning as I did of waking up the next day with Fabio's hairline.
As I recall, the Lions got creamed, and I found myself in front of the mirror minutes later with a pet clippers and a Gillette razor. It was a matter of saving face, you see. I didn't want to admit that I really shaved my head because I was bald. No, I shaved my head because the Lions lost. Pretty sneaky. Pretty dumb, but pretty sneaky.
Today, the man that walks amongst you as Ryan Rhodes is the same man that bid farewell to his remaining follical sprouts all those years ago. He's a shaven-headed man who has accepted his fate, a fate that, thanks to a growing societal acceptance of the hair impaired, means I can register my hair color as "bald" in Montana.
And, you know what? I'm still a smoking hot specimen of male hunkiness, so that's pretty cool.
Posted by Ryan at June 10, 2004 11:15 AMWhat I can't understand is why do men go bald on their heads but not their ears? As we get older, all that lost hair seems to start sprouting out of ears and noses and backs.
Its nasty!
And I just realized how you can live in Mini-soda, land of freezy pops and frozen tongues to flag poles, you're so damned smoking hot that you just barely notice the chill.
I've never shaved my head but I have dyed my hair a few times for kicks. Haven't decided if I'm going blond for this summer yet though.
Posted by: Johnny Huh? at June 10, 2004 12:00 PMI have an abundance of hair. I still have my head hair (knock on wood), for which I thank the gods daily. But I also have back hair, ear hair, nose hair, and eyebrows that, in a pinch, I could comb back to simulate head hair. Please note that eyebrows should actually be in quotes; god gave me one. Nerves and tweezers of steel have mad them two.
I didn't really mind the back hair until it started sprouting up on my shoulders. Now I'm thinking lasers.
Every time I hear women bitching about "patriarchal" body images I think "Rogaine, dynamic tension, isometrics, fucking hair plugs and, for god's sake, penis enlargement".
When I hear them bitching about how many women have starved themselves to look like society says they should, I always want to point out how many men have put on uniforms and gotten blown into very small pieces in order to act like society says they should act.
It's a lot tougher being a guy than women will ever understand or admit.
Posted by: Joshua at June 10, 2004 12:29 PMmissing an "e" up there somewhere.
Posted by: at June 10, 2004 12:30 PMI think you look great. Never saw a pic. of you with hair... but I think the bald aproach works! and it sure beats the hell out of the perverbial comb over!!! ;-) More power to ya - smoking hot speciment of male hunkiness!!
Posted by: MH2 at June 10, 2004 01:37 PMUh, Joshua? Breast augmentation, liposuction, tummy tuck, upper lip waxing, Brazilian, anorexia, bulimia, fake nails, electrolysis, laser hair removal, Nair…need I go on.
And yes, men have been blown to bits in very brave acts of sacrifice I will never quite be able to fathom….but women weren’t ALLOWED to make those same sacrifices.
Bottom line, both genders have their crosses to bear, but a large percentage of male time is occupied with figuring out which brain will be in charge at any given moment. Women use that time to multitask and to remove the hair which is apparently abhorrent to men (OMG – is that underarm hair – EWWW).
Loribo: I don't really know you, so forgive me if this sounds harsh, but horseshit.
A of all, if men were just getting blown to bits in "very brave acts of sacrifice I will never quite be able to fathom", I'd just chalk it up to a form of selective insanity and have done. Some guys are mysteriously compelled to go kill each other in wars. Bummer.
But one of the many benefits we guys enjoy in this patriarchal male-dominated society is, we get drafted. Literally millions of young men were drafted into the U.S. military in the 20th century alone, and several hundred thousand of them came back in little boxes. And, as long as we're talking breast enlargement and tummy tucks, let's not forget prosthetic limbs, nerve damage, PTSD, wheel chairs, and colostomy bags.
B of all, as far as "a large percentage of male time is occupied with figuring out which brain will be in charge at any given moment", again-- I don't really know you, so forgive me if this sounds too harsh, but fuck you. If I described the experience of being a woman as "a large percentage of female time is spent watching soap operas and trying to decide how to spend their husband's money", that would so obviously be a rude sexist thing to say, you'd barely have to aim to blow me out of the water. But you make some sexist crack about how guys can't stop thinking with their dicks and you don't even have the good grace to swing it as irony? Yeah. Apparently one of the other burdens women have to deal with in our society is that nobody holds them responsible for their antiquated bigoted concepts of what it means to be a man.
Look, I know second wave feminism sold women a bill of goods including but not limited to the idea that all women are victims of a male-dominated society and anyone who questions that is a symptom of "the backlash", but I was raised by hippies, and they taught me to treat women as equals: which means I'm not going to sit here and be amused by your offensive egocentricity.
I spend two hours a day, three days a week in the gym. I spend time shaving, I watch my diet, and I shop for clothes that make me look thinner. I blow extra money on haircuts. I pluck my fucking eyebrows. When I was 13 my dad called me fat so many times I started puking my food up to try and lose weight. And when I was 18 I was required by law to sign a piece of paper that meant I may have to go to a foreign country and commit cold-blooded murder in support of a cause I didn't agree with. Or, hey, bonus— I might have gotten killed or maimed myself. And now, it looks like they may change the law to extend the draft age to 34, so I'll have to worry about this shit again. I get a dozen e-mails a day telling me my dick's too small, and there's a pill on the market that's designed especially to make me feel like a defective if I can't get it up.
So really. Boo fucking hoo about your fake nails and your fake-and-bake tan. And hey— if you wanna get blown up in the Army, be my guest. I'd vote for the Equal Rights Amendment in a hot fucking minute.
Gee Joshua, and here I thought we were making lighthearted postings regarding hair growth and attendant gender issues. I hadn’t realized we were airing all of our personal history and anger management issues. My mistake.
Posted by: loribo at June 10, 2004 06:22 PMNo no, my mistake, really. I guess all that business about people getting blown to pieces and eating disorders gave me the impression we might be discussing something serious.
Ha! Silly me. By all means, continue with your light hearted postings about anorexia and war casualties.
He he. How could I take that seriously? Boy, is my face red.
Posted by: Joshua at June 10, 2004 06:32 PMThank you Joshua. Your ability to spew venom has been duly noted. Something for you to consider.
Posted by: loribo at June 10, 2004 06:50 PMDon't be taken too aback by Joshua, loribo. My introduction to the man was pretty damned jarring, too. But, he's grown on me in the strangest way, it's kind of difficult to explain, really. Suffice it to say, if you can push past the slicing insults and liberal pounding of expletives, you eventually learn that, although he can be a monumental asshole, he's actually a really decent guy. I know, I know. It was a tough conclusion for me to draw as well.
Posted by: Ryan at June 10, 2004 07:20 PMAnd those attitude pills would have to be the size of elephant nuts to even have a nominal effect on Joshua. They'd probably just make him gassy.
Posted by: Ryan at June 10, 2004 07:23 PMHey, Loribo. I'm a woman, and yet I have never given a second's fucking thought to: Breast augmentation, liposuction, tummy tuck, upper lip waxing, Brazilian, anorexia, bulimia, fake nails, electrolysis, laser hair removal, Nair. Because it's stupid. For god's sake, girl, go read a book or something.
Like Joshua, in my formative years I got the silly idea that I was supposed to grow up to be a responsible adult, not a baby or a barbie doll or a professional victim.
Get a life.
Posted by: Frances at June 10, 2004 11:25 PMJoshua, remind me to not ever get into a battle of wits with you. I am totally under armed.
Loribo,the difference is that for women, it's all about how you should look. With men, it's all about how you should ACT, and I don't remember anyone dying of too much waxing. And waxing is an option, the draft is not. That was what Joshua is trying to say.
Frances, we should all read a book man.
The topic was Ryan being bald.
Bald is sexy. (Picure me nodding and wiggling my eyebrows).
And now that I clicked your link Loribo, I find it offensive that you think from one post from Joshua that he has anger management issues.
If you'd read him for half as long as I have, you'd know he doesn't have alot of anger issues, but stupidity issues, oh yeah.
So if you feel like he had turned and locked his sights on you, well hmm. It's not hard to figure that one out.
As in he doesn't deal with stupidity well.
(Figured I'd better clarify because of well, my OWN stupidity.)
Donna, you and I are truly sisters under the skin. I'm snickering over the way we often tag-team in our rush to Joshua's defence.
I'm sure he sleeps better knowing that the grandmas have got his back. Or more likely, rolls his eyes ...
Posted by: Frances at June 12, 2004 01:49 AMI know, especially when he soooo doesn't need us to, and you are right, I'm sure he is rolling his eyes. LOL, but young gramma, young dammit!
Posted by: Donna at June 12, 2004 08:01 PMOh, for Pete’s sake. Josh, speaking as someone who knows, respects, and likes you: you got caught in a poorly-constructed argument and you’re defensive about it.
If you want to talk about serious threats to life and health, we can throw the societal and governmental mandate of Male as Defender against women’s biological and cultural command to bear and raise children, and see what sticks. (e.g. I don’t have to register for the draft. You will never tear your anal sphincter delivering a baby.) However, I don’t really feel like debating that right now, because every hour I spend arguing with virtual people on other virtual people’s blogs is an hour of my life I never get back. Josh, we can argue this one at a party sometime, just for kicks.
If, however, what we’re talking about is the burden of aesthetics (and I’m not sure why you propped dieting up against dying for your country as gender-specific obligations) the question of who has it worse is too subjective to make much of a case for. Additionally, since any aesthetic body-modification is entirely voluntary -– barring the difficult-to-quantify appearance-discrimination factor -– we’re arguing… what? Who’s a bigger victim of marketing and the media? Or just that men are victims, too?
Posted by: molly at June 15, 2004 12:55 PMHowever, I don’t really feel like debating that right now, because every hour I spend arguing with virtual people on other virtual people’s blogs is an hour of my life I never get back.
Roughly translated as: "I will tell you you're wrong, but I will not debate the point because I think debating on the internet is a waste of time."
Yeeeeah. Okay.
you got caught in a poorly-constructed argument and you’re defensive about it.
Is that what happened? Whew. Thanks. I was wondering— and my own motives are such a mystery to me.
But— and obviously this is a waste of time because you don't debate on the internet —let me just float another theory.
Maybe you didn't understand my initial point. Because it was stated pretty plainly, and yet you're still asking, we’re arguing… what? Who’s a bigger victim of marketing and the media? Or just that men are victims, too?
Allow me to reiterate what I was arguing:
It's a lot tougher being a guy than women will ever understand or admit.
The reason I mention this is because I am have a lingering annoyance, generated by the approximately 1,756,432 conversations that I've had with various self-proclaimed "feminists" who seem to believe (and rather than claim to know what they believe I will stipulate that this is merely my impression after an extensive sample) that:
A) Social expectations based on gender are a more egregious burden for women than they are for men.
B) Because "society" is a "patriarchy", social expectations directed at women are being imposed on women by men and therefore represent a kind of oppression— while social expectations directed at men, by virtue of having been generated by "patriarchy", are, variously, the product of some crude democracy, men's own fault, not "oppressive" because they're "self-policing", some combination of the above— or various other descriptors that generally boil down to: "Being a woman sucks more than being a man, because men run the show. Women are victims of male oppression."
So when I read a post like Ryan's, I think, "Wow, it sucks that Ryan had to go through that humiliating experience. It sucks that I live in fear of what amounts to a completely unpreventable biological process because I'm afraid it will make me less attractive. It sucks that society is not more self-critical of that prejudice. A woman who starves herself to death is considered a victim. A guy who uses Rogaine or, god forbid, that brown spraypaint stuff, is a subject of ridicule and derision. And the most fucked up thing is, the reason guys do that stuff is that they want to be attractive to women. But even extremely liberal women, who view 'the beauty myth' as a plague upon the earth, have very little compunction about rejecting men based on physical characteristics that are completely beyond their control. There is, in my opinion, remarkably little appreciation, among women, of the pressure that men are under to look a certain way and act a certain way. I believe this blind spot is, in large part, the result of a conviction common to feminists that men, generally, are the authors of all social expectations and therefore carry the responsibility for the ill effects of same. That attitude has always seemed incredibly naïve and self-serving."
All of which I condensed down to, "It's a lot tougher being a guy than women will ever understand or admit."
And so on. But hey, don't you worry about replying. I know you've got better things to do.
You're baiting me, dear heart, and I'm rising to it one last time. Your "Yeeeeah. Okay." point is well-taken, though, so I won't offer anything but this:
I have never said the things you've ascribed to "feminists."
I do not believe the things you've ascribed to "feminists." I do not see the things you've ascribed to "feminists" posted here. I am actually capable of understanding and admitting that it's really fuck'n tough for guys, too (despite the handicap of being a woman and a self-proclaimed feminist), so I have no stake in continuing an argument that you're having with 1,756,432 other women. I'm through posting here*; the last word is yours if you want it.
* in the comments section of a complete stranger's blog. Seriously, if you want to have this conversation in real life, pick an evening and I'll buy you the beer.
Posted by: molly at June 15, 2004 04:33 PMI do not see the things you've ascribed to "feminists" posted here.
An opinion I ascribed to "feminists":
Social expectations based on gender are a more egregious burden for women than they are for men.
Something posted here:
Bottom line, both genders have their crosses to bear, but a large percentage of male time is occupied with figuring out which brain will be in charge at any given moment. Women use that time to multitask and to remove the hair which is apparently abhorrent to men
Now, you may argue if you wish that Loribo (who I thought was female, but now that I notice it's Loribo, I wonder) wasn't suggesting that women's burden is greater than men's. For my part, I think the operative word in the above excerpt is "but".
he last word is yours if you want it.
Thanks.
Posted by: Joshua at June 15, 2004 05:27 PMGood Point. Anyways, this was where i met her. You can join for free as well www.redtricircle.com
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